The Rise and Fall of a Construction Giant (eBook)

The History, People, and Stories of CFW Construction

Jr. Farrar Dick (Autor)

Ann Marie Martin (Herausgeber)

eBook Download: EPUB

2019
324 Seiten
Fresh Ink Group (Verlag)
978-1-947867-43-7 (ISBN)

Infos

Determined to bring utilities and small-building construction to rural areas, William R. Carter joined with Dick Farrar and John Williams to form the CFW Construction Company in Fayetteville, Tennessee, 1952. Named for the partners, CFW expanded into building plants, roads, tunnels, bridges, and more. Within forty years the company grew to five offices, 14 subsidiaries, a thousand pieces of equipment, and a proud workforce of more than 1,500 across a dozen states.

Then came the scandals.

By the end of the 20thcentury, CFW was gone, and the lives of everybody had changed. Dick Farrar's son was there for the best and the worst. Now he's written the definitive history, not just about a company, but a region and its people. With nearly a hundred restored photos, most in color, Farrar, Jr., tells the true story, naming names and documenting the details. The Rise and Fall of a Construction Giantis a keepsake, a historical record, the chronicle of an era, a compelling story told by the man at its center in the end.

Textauszug

CHAPTER 5

“F” for Farrar

My father, William Parker Farrar, was born in Lynchburg, Tennessee, on July 28, 1917, the fourth of five children of Claude “Jack” Farrar and Dayse Haslett Farrar. Jack Farrar was a Moore County farmer and hardware store owner whose partner was his father-in-law, Samuel L. Haslett. Their store, Lynchburg Hardware, has been located on the Lynchburg Square since it opened.

In 1924 Jack had the opportunity to purchase a 240-acre tract of farmland on Mimosa Road in Lincoln County from the Federal Land Bank in Louisville, Kentucky. Norris Creek ran through the property, backing the Mimosa Road frontage. The farm’s centerpiece was a beautiful two-story brick home built in 1909 and named Grandview. Just a few feet south of the magnificent structure was the farm’s anchor, a three-brick-thick barn built in 1917 from brick made on-site.

Grandfather Jack was a hard worker, good farmer and businessman, and knew how to work farm hands. He grew up on a farm in Flat Creek, Tennessee, one of eleven children who were expected to pull their share of the farm workload. He graduated from Union College in Jackson, Tennessee. Grandmother Dayse, an only child, graduated from Ward-Belmont in Nashville, Tennessee. Jack was born November 27, 1882, and Dayse on June 21, 1886.

Four of the five children made the move from Moore County to Lincoln County with Jack and Dayse. Wade Hampton was 16, Sara Evelyn was 9, William Parker was 7, and James Kirkpatrick was 3. Paul Haslett, age 11, stayed behind in Lynchburg to live with his grandparents, Sam and Evelyn Haslett.

Wade did not experience much of the Mimosa Road farm life. As soon as he graduated from Central High School, he was admitted to State Teachers College in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Sara helped with the household chores. In the beginning, Jim was too young to take care of many of the “man” chores, but he did gather the eggs and feed the chickens and take care of the lighter chores connected with farm life.

Somewhere between 1917 and 1924, William Parker’s name was changed to “Dick.” I have never known why. Whenever I would ask, no matter whom I asked, I would receive a similar reply: “I do not recall” or “I do not know the answer.”

Farm life was not easy for the Farrar brood. Their parents expected them to earn their keep and then pay the washwoman a quarter or fifty cents a week to wash their clothes. Hand-me-down clothes were their regular attire, and even Sara would be seen wearing shirts and pants the boys had worn. I recall my father once saying to me, “I was behind in paying the washwoman two dollars. I was scared to death she was going to tell my father. One weekend Wade, who had been working part-time for a surveyor while going to college, came home. Upon leaving to return to Murfreesboro, he called to me saying, “I have something for you,” and gave me two one-dollar bills. I could not get to that washwoman fast enough.”

Listening to my father’s stories, I came to understand that life on a farm was stressful in the 1930s during the Great Depression. Had his father and mother, according to him, not been hard working, keen with business, and farm-seasoned, the Federal Land Bank might have foreclosed on the farm. My father said that the lessons he learned between fifteen years of age in 1932 and twenty-one in 1939 were lessons no school could have taught. The Depression years were hard on every American, but the farmers were living the Depression long before it actually occurred.

My father’s years at Central High School in Fayetteville were NFL years—not for long. Possessing a Haslett or Pennington or Parker temper, fighting was almost a daily occurrence for him. Dick was sorely afraid of his father—and his mother as well—but away from home and the farm, he had no fear.

One day—I’ve never known why or who—a teacher at the high school said or did something that infuriated Dick, and he held that teacher out over a second-story windowsill and threatened to drop him. That was the end of Dick’s days at Central High School.

In order to finish school and graduate, Dick’s only option seemed to be Moore County High School. Notwithstanding his temper, he was a good student and made good grades. Provided he stayed out of trouble, he would be able to go to Moore County High School and live with his grandparents, Sam and Evelyn Haslett. Dick starred in school plays and played football on Friday nights. Once, as a tailback, he broke loose for a ninety-nine-yard run only to stumble and fall on the one-yard line. But after a week in school, Dick would get up at daybreak on Saturday, catch a ride to Fayetteville, and work on the farm on Saturday and Sunday. Then it was back to Lynchburg on Sunday afternoon.

Upon graduating from Moore County High School, Dick continued to help his father on the farm while seeking supplemental income work elsewhere. These jobs included the service station once known as Three-Point Shell as well as pumping gas at W.B. Posey Buick Company. He also worked for Ragland-Potter, a wholesale food grocer distributor, who had built and opened a distributorship at the corner of Franklin Street and East Market Street. In recent years that building has seen multiple tenants, including the Elks Lodge, Fred’s Department Store, Motlow State Community College, and First Class Printing. Presently it houses various office tenants.

When Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated president of the United States on March 4, 1933, he promised the American people that he would “wage a war against the emergency” that was the Great Depression. FDR’s New Deal policies included the formation of the Tennessee Valley Authority, which built dams to control flooding and provide inexpensive hydroelectric power for the people of the region.

The 1934-38 period was significant in the life of young Dick Farrar, too. One day, actual time and date unknown, a young lass caught Dick’s eye. She was the daughter of Lincoln County Sheriff John A. Pool. In 1939, when Dick was holding down two jobs but carrying very few dollars in his pocket—he was, however, current with the Mimosa Road washwoman—Dick Farrar and Robbie Iris Pool were married. Ragland-Potter had become a full-time job. The couple lived at 311 Market Street East. (State Attorney General Robert Carter’s office is there today.) All Dick needed to get to his job was a good pair of work shoes.

Robbie continued working as a fill-in and on weekends at Kuhn’s Department Store. She also helped her mother, Alice Hayes Pool, fulfill a role that typically fell to the sheriff ’s wife: prepare meals for those jailed on the banks of the scenic Elk River at the “Riverside Hotel.”

With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the United States entered World War II. Wade Hampton Farrar and James Kirkpatrick Farrar received the “Greetings” letter from President Roosevelt. Paul Haslett Farrar, due to childhood sickness and illnesses, was unable to serve, as were many other American citizens. I am uncertain as to Sara Evelyn’s classification and status on December 7, 1941, or later.

While some Farrars went off to war, others continued farming. Mimosa Road was sparsely populated countryside during this time, so the closest neighbor might live five or ten miles away in any direction. Rolling grocery stores often carried the news of these far-flung neighbors up and down Mimosa Road.

One date that stood out in the memories of the family, farm hands, and neighbors was August 28, 1942. Jack had mounted his beloved stallion, King, to ride across Norris Creek to the farm’s northeastern-most field to check on the hands harvesting the crops with three teams of mules. Neither Jack nor Dayse ever drove an automobile, so horses were a prime mode of transportation. King was a big, beautiful, slick, solid black stallion with a small white diamond on his forehead. When Jack arrived at the field, he dismounted and tied King’s reins to a limb of a massive oak tree. Then he sat down to enjoy the shade and inspect the progress of the early fall harvesting.

On a turnaround with the mule team, one of the tenant farmers noticed “Mr. Jack” lying motionless against the big oak. The man ran to his side but found no life. Claude “Jack” Farrar had died as a result of a heart attack at sixty years of age.

With Wade and Jimmy unable to return, Dick, the son who best knew the farm, was the logical choice to assume its management. In the fall of 1942, Dick and Robbie, along with “Dickie” (yours truly), moved into the downstairs of the 1909 Grandview Farrar residence. Dayse, or Grandmother Farrar, now the widow of Jack, moved to the upper level. The home was spacious, and Grandmother, in spite of “tough times,” made it a showplace to the extent possible.

The move to Grandview was a homecoming of sorts for Robbie as well as Dick. The kitchen was like a companion to Robbie because she used to help Grandmother on hog-killing days, thrasher days, silage days, etc. When the farm neighbors would bring their tenants to the Farrar farm to assist with such, the twenty to thirty or so tenants would be fed dinner, always a very large production. Jack Farrar would return the favor when necessary to his neighbor farmers.

For Dick, it was as if he had never left Mimosa Road. He had often helped his father on afternoons and weekends. The sheep, cattle, mules, horses, hogs, chickens, goats, all numerous in numbers, had to be fed and otherwise cared for....

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 9.3.2019
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Geschichte / Politik ► Regional- / Landesgeschichte
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
• Themenwelt: Technik ► Bauwesen
• Schlagworte: bid-rigging • construction history • fayetteville • Southern essay • southern history • Southern story • Tennessee History
• ISBN-10: 1-947867-43-1 / 1947867431
• ISBN-13: 978-1-947867-43-7 / 9781947867437